MrDaniel Goldsworthy

Daniel (Dan) is a scholar in legal theory and jurisprudence whose research focuses on the methodological foundations of legal inquiry. His doctoral research examines the nature and extent of the evaluative commitments necessarily involved in theorising about law, with particular attention to whether moral evaluation is required at the outset of legal-theoretical inquiry when identifying law’s important features.

His work is motivated by the view that greater clarity about the evaluative and methodological commitments underpinning legal theory matters not only for jurisprudence as an academic discipline, but also for how law is understood, justified, and applied as one of society’s most significant institutions and social practices. In this respect, his research explores the implications of different approaches to legal theory for understanding what law is, how it ought to regulate social life, and how legal systems respond to emerging challenges involving environmental governance, animal welfare, technological change, and artificial intelligence.

More broadly, Daniel’s scholarship explores the relationship between legal theory, moral and political philosophy, and public law. His work investigates what follows if legal theory is understood not as a morally neutral descriptive enterprise, but as a form of inquiry that is, at least in part, evaluative in character.

Alongside his theoretical research, Daniel has published across a range of applied legal fields, including constitutional law and theory, statutory interpretation, environmental law, animal welfare and sentience, public international law, executive power, anti-doping regulation, legal education, and questions of legal personhood.

He teaches in the areas of statutory interpretation, public law, constitutional law, and public international law.

Daniel has held visiting and research appointments both nationally and internationally.

Currently, he is a Fellow of the Earth System Governance Project and serves as a General Assembly Member of Greenpeace Australia Pacific. He is also an advisor to the Sentient Animal Law Foundation, a law reform charity and think tank focused on advancing legal protections for sentient animals.

Daniel is an Australian lawyer admitted to practice in the Supreme Court of Victoria. He has also held numerous governance, tribunal, and board-related appointments across the environmental, higher education, and sporting sectors. These roles have included service as Company Secretary of Forest Stewardship Council Australia and New Zealand, membership of university academic boards and appeals committees at Victoria University and Deakin University, and appointments as chair and panel member on sporting tribunals for Basketball Victoria and Paddle Australia.

Outside academia and practice, Daniel is an avid paddler, surfer, runner, and multisport enthusiast.